Mental Exercise

Water into Wine

Start with the word “water” and turn it into the word “wine” in five steps. On each step, you can add a letter, change a letter or remove a letter. The result after each step must also be a word.

Super Math

Suppose you perform the following multiplication:

1 x 3 x . . . x 997 x 999

(all odd numbers from 1 to 999). What will be the last digit (rightmost digit) of the final answer?

Sudoku Hive

The hexagonal figure below, place the numbers from 1 through 19 so that every row (a row may contain three, four, or five cells) has the same total. If you want a hint, see below

Hint: the total of every row should be thirty-eight.

What am I?

If you say my name, I no longer exist.

Four Thirty

Can you rearrange the twelve matches shown below so that they represent the time half past four?

Table Game

Suppose you and a friend play a game with quarters on a perfectly round table. The object of the game is for each of you to continue to place quarters on the table until one of you has no space remaining on the table to place a quarter. You move first, what’s your winning strategy?

Big State

Which of the following statements are true?

• The land area of Alaska could contain the next two largest U.S. states.
• The land area of Alaska could contain the next three largest states.

The land area of Alaska could contain the next four largest states.

Answers

Water Into Wine.  water > waiter > whiter > white > whine > wine 

Odd Multiplier.  The answer is 5. Any number that ends in 5 multiplied by an odd number gives a number ending in 5.

Sudoku Hive.  The solution is:

What Am I?  Silence.

Four Thirty.

Table Game.  On the first move place a quarter in the exact center of the table. After your opponent places his coin, place yours exactly on the opposite side of the table. Repeat until your opponent has no moves left.

Big State.  The first two statements are true, the last is false because Alaska is smaller then the combined sizes of the next for smaller states.